St Helena

Andrew Rosindell: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many inhabitants of St Helena have taken up residence in the United Kingdom in the last five years.

Gillian Merron: My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has not had any meetings with officials from St. Helena in the last two years. However, I had a constructive meeting with Councillor William Drabble during the Overseas Territories Consultative Council in October this year, and my hon. Friend, Meg Munn, then Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, met with Councillor Brian Isaacs at the same event in December 2007. Foreign and Commonwealth Office and other Government officials are in regular contact with St. Helena officials.

Zimbabwe: Politics and Government

Keith Simpson: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what estimate his Department has made of the number of members and supporters of the Movement for Democratic Change in Zimbabwe who have disappeared since September 2008; and what reports his Department has received on the likely whereabouts of those who have disappeared.

Gillian Merron: We have received reports that approximately 18 supporters of the MDC, including a two-year-old child, have been abducted in recent weeks and are still missing. In addition, Jestina Mukoko of the Zimbabwe Peace Project (ZPP) and two ZPP colleagues were abducted on 3 and 8 December and have not been found. The government has failed to produce these missing people, despite Court Orders, and despite the efforts of their colleagues, lawyers, non-governmental organisations and the international community to locate them and secure their safe release or fair trial. We are seriously concerned for the safety of all those who have disappeared and condemn their extra-judicial abduction and detention. We continue to call, bilaterally, as well as in the UN Human Rights and Security Councils and with EU member states, for an end to all such human rights abuses in Zimbabwe.

Nuclear Power Stations: Decommissioning

John Thurso: To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change what estimate he has made of the resource budget costs of nuclear decommissioning provisions by the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority in  (a) 2008-09,  (b) 2009-10 and  (c) 2010-11; and if he will make a statement.

Mike O'Brien: The funding requirements of the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) were considered within the context of the 2007 comprehensive spending review. The settlement provides the NDA with £5.1bn Government funding over the three years (ie £1.8 billion in 2008-09, £1.6 billion in 2009-10 and £1.7 billion in 2010-11) of which £1.4 billion is resource and £3.7 billion is capital. Together with the income that the NDA will earn from commercial activities in the period, it is estimated that the total funding available over the three years will be over £8 billion.